Talk twenty.
Bali, 22nd December
- This is not love from the first sight but, surely, with time we’re going to fancy the island.
- This dream island of many people turns out to be a dream easy to come true judging after the number of tourists. Adding to this great number of cars circulating here, we are getting an impression that we are in a big city and not on a relatively small island.
- This is a price to pay for staying at a popular place.
- There must a place on the island which’d givea chance of getting to know this beautiful site and fall in love with it. But we are staying five kilometres away from Savinyak and twenty from Kuta, and there’s no public transportation system, which makes it necessary to travel in taxis that move with a turtle pace because of constant traffic jams.
- Our beautiful villa – a four-room hotel - is located on the south-east coast of the island. It’s a villa with a charming name - Laki Uma[2], in English House of Men.
- Our hotel gives the impression of a private residence with the maid. Only three out of four rooms are occupied but we are attended by six to eight young men. Everything is on site (no meals, just breakfasts, though): washing, ironing, cleaning, etc. If you want to go downtown, they will take you in a car, but you have to come back in a taxi.
- One massage per week is included. Briefly speaking, I’m comfortable here and I don’t feel like going to town where there’s a lot of car and scooter traffic, noise, and the smell of exhaust fumes.
- The history of Bali museum was pretty boring, wasn’t it?
- I, in turn, wasn’t turned on by that batik wholesale store and I didn’t fancy the idea of going to see the silverware….
- And you were lucky because we got prevented from going there by our car breaking down in the middle of the road. Almost a new ford refused to run and …
- As usual taxis turned out to be indispensable.
- I wonder whether our villa hotel whose guests are exclusively gay men, employs guys who count on something more than tips.
- Do you count on something more?
- Don’t be silly. I watch them at work and they don’t seem either particularly hard-working or concerned about their role to pamper the guests; they seem to treat this as any other work place. However, in the hotel information brochure you can find a warning that the service people are not sexual objects, so you must treat them adequately.
- From what we know, the owners are a Belgian and an Indonesian who live in Europe. They don’t watch their business too closely.
- You can’t deny that the place is beautiful and our apartment with a huge bathroom is really luxurious.
- The living and dining room by the pool are the nicest.
- I like our breakfasts in the company of two Australians – Paul and Andrew who amuse us with their stories about Bali gay life which they are familiar with from their previous stays here.
- Those stories of theirs are mainly about their delight with the fact that in spite of so called advanced age (they both are over fifty), they can enjoy unceasing success with locals. Absolutely not for money!!
- Aha. So, there’s some hope for me too!
- Don’t even try!
- In Savinyak, actually, there’s one street only with some gay bars which use their door barkers to invite tourists to go inside.
- Everything is wide open, you can see from the street what’s going on inside.
- And sometimes there’re going on a lot of things…
- Paul and Andrew persuaded us to go and see the Miss Christmas 2011 contest.
- Did you see? There were a dozen of Indonesian boys called here lady-boys who represented different countries of the world. The main prize of the contest was to be USD 500. It’s a lot of money for a young Indonesian guy (young Indonesian girl?). The finals will take place in two days’ time.
- In this part of Asia the phenomenon of lady-boys is universal and socially accepted. Whateve. But we’re going to pass over the finals of the contest. What I’ve seen so far left me bored enough.
- To make things clear: the definition of lady-boys refers to transgenic people or feminized gay boys. Sometimes they are said to be the third gender. I was watching today’s show with some indulgence but the other guests, Australian men mainly and some young women as well, seemed to have a lot of fun.
- I wonder after how many drinks, though. Paul and Andrew looked amused, too.
- The whole of Bali lives of the Australians. The Aussies love to come here because Bali is so close for them.
- Because everything is so cheap here for them. Cheap drinks, cheap restaurants and cheap designer’s clothes, cheap sexual attractions. Not to call them services.
- Nothing was particularly cheap for us.
- Whether the attractions about which you are talking about were cheap or not, we didn’t have a chance of proving.
- In practice, it stands to reason.
- What was it like for you after your New Year’s Eve party at the Galery?
- What a strange association! Why are you so suddenly coming up with the Galery?
- Because we are talking about the boys and bars here, on Bali. I assume we are going to talk about functioning of the gay scene in current Poland, since I know which paths your thoughts take. I’d like to know what it was like at the beginning, after those big changes in our country.
- At the beginning there was chaos. It was difficult to get any information where, what, when. The word of mouth was the best source. Although the commune was gone, there weren’t many bottom-up initiatives creating space for the gay world. Lambda – an association whose mission now is building a positive identity and creating social acceptance of the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people, came to life much later, in 1997.
- For years there had been „newsletters” – the magazines for that group of people, hadn’t there?.
- They had a small range. I’m going to ask you later on what role they played in your life. In Szczecin there had been one restaurant – bar To tu (It’s here). Funny, To tu was located in the very centre of town and it became a meeting place for Szczecin gays completely spontaneously. It happened when someone from the dark communist time had an idea of keeping this bar open twenty four hours a day.
- I happened to have been there, too…
- That’s interesting…
- Stay cool. It was some years before we would meet.
- The Galery were owned by a guy who inherited an old house do on the route Wrocław – Jelenia Góra, and he decided to open a motel – restaurant with the idea of advertising it as a gay-friendly place.
- Was he gay?
- A declared one and open in the subject. The idea was great but the accomplishment was some weaker. He didn’t have much cash, so the hotel service was more than modest.
- I know something about it.
- He was doing fine at the beginning but his attraction to alcohol and boys was stronger than attraction to work, so it ended up badly.
- What exactly happened?
- He fell into such debts in state institutions, so in the end his business got auctioned off.
- When did it happen? It was 2003 when we were there for the last time.
- Some years ago. For me it was a place of cult as the first gay club in Poland in which I felt fine and enjoyed three New Year’s Eve parties and some other events.
- And you met me there!
- We’ll soon get to that historic moment. It’s still 1993 and I’m in a difficult moment of my life after losing my parents and the trauma of parting with Andrzej after many years of a relationship. I’m trying to find some peace plunging into absorbing work over long hours.
- For quite good cash.
- I admit, financially it was the best time in my life. A good salary from Sweden and prospering PROGRESS, with little competition in Szczecin, would give me full independence.
- You were said to have changed cars very often.
- More often than the underwear. Probably some would claim so. Human envy is unlimited. When, after many years of driving the little Fiat and aged Volvo, I bought a new Volkswagen Golf in Germany, I kept two steed in my stable. The Golf and the worn Fiat 126P.
- So why such an opinion about you?
- Some beautiful Sunday when I would host all my female bosses from Göteborg in Szczecin, from the doorsteps of the university where I’d teach potential English teachers, the Golf disappeared.
- Has it been found?
- Never.
- Then you drove the Fiat, didn’t you?
- You must be kidding. Was I supposed to drive in it my well-built female bosses? The following morning I purchased at a dealership (I don’t remember what such places were called then) a new Forman.
- What’s that?
- A station wagon Škoda. It served me for over six good years!
- That purchase excited your enemies so much?
- How would I know whether I had enemies. I’d call them envious people. Little people who’d rather look into other people wallets instead of taking care of their work and money. Anyway, I did hear a comment about myself after the event – „What a dodger!”
- Did you take it to your heart?
- I don’t think so. However, again I’d learn that they’re not your merits, your hard work that count. The objects of envy aren’t either your abilities and knowledge or what you do for the others. The objects of fierce envy are what can be seen on the outside, what you possess, but the others don’t have.
- It’s better not to have anything. Those who have and drink a lot are the best. Because they are worse than we are.
- Ha!
- Let’s go back to the thank you letter you got for the photos of the New Year’s Eve in the Galery.
- A letter like any others.
- But there was a telephone number in it. A stationary one, I guess, in those times.
- Yes, they were almost prehistoric times. As there was a telephone number, a period of every day conversations between Szczecin and Wrocław began. Talking on the phone regularly we would get to know each other, get used to each other.
- A feeling of love was developing, wasn’t it?
- A platonic feeling!! At the beginning we wouldn’t plan a meeting. We both were extremely busy professionally.
[1] Laki Uma Bali
[2] Laki Uma Baliv
